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“Alone?” he asked sharply. “All this way?”
“Yes.” With pride, she smoothed back her hair. So he thought her too fragile a creature to survive on her own, outside the walls and courtyards of the castle. She felt pride in showing him his mistake.
“Since coming here, I’ve made contact with my brother’s men, who have in turn borne missives to Felix for me. One of the things I requested of him was that he send messages near and far searching for you.”
“One reached me…only days ago. So now I am here.”
Arianne was not fooled by the calm simplicity with which he spoke. There was more to his story than he was telling. She remembered how she had accused him of not caring for Marcus because he had not come sooner. Now, looking into the lean, harsh face before her, she realized that she had misjudged him. There was something more here, something he wasn’t telling her. Nicholas had once been a wild daredevil of a boy, perhaps even irresponsible—after all, his father had banished him, had he not?
But no longer. She would have staked her life that this man took his responsibilities seriously. They—orsomething—seemed to weigh on him, to be a burden upon those great, wide shoulders. He bore it well, but it was there all the same, now that she had taken care to look.
Suddenly she could have bitten off her tongue. “I said some things earlier, my lord, that I regret. I was upset, angry. I shouldn’t have judged you or spoken to you thus.”
A slow smile smoothed the harsh line of his lips. His grave face lightened. “Don’t think of it, Ari.”
Ari.The nickname he and Marcus had tagged her with all those years ago, when she’d tried in vain to keep up with them.
“But I believe my words have wounded you, my lord…”
This time his smile was so quick and unexpectedly warm that it pierced straight to her heart. “You’re a strange woman, Arianne. One moment you despise me, and the next you worry over having hurt me with words. What am I to do with you?”
Flustered by the light, musing way he was gazing into her eyes, and fighting weariness and the temptation to succumb to his very potent and thoroughly male charm, Arianne spoke the first words that popped into her head.
“Take me to bed, my lord.”
His dark, slanting brows rose and laughter sprang into those cool gray eyes.
Too late, Arianne realized what she had said.
“I mean, lead me to bed…tomybed…er,abed. I am weary beyond belief…I must sleep…I only meant…”
“No, my girl. Don’t say any more. I won’t pretend to mistake your meaning. You’ve gone through much today.”
He helped her to rise, then scooped her cloak from the floor and spread it on the thin straw pallet by the far wall, the only bedding in the cottage.
“Sleep now. By the morrow, I’ll have concocted a plan to free Marcus. So you may rest easy. He will not be in the dungeons much longer.”
“Where will you sleep, my lord?”
“Before the fire, upon the floor.”
“You will scarcely be comfortable!”
“I have slept in far worse places, Ari,” he said with some amusement. He put his hands on her shoulders and pushed her gently down on the pallet as if she were a stubborn child resisting her bed. “Sleep,” he said firmly. “In the morning you will tell me just what you thought you were doing with that ruffian in the stable.”
Her limbs seemed to melt as she eased her tired body onto the pallet. In a twinkling she was curled on her side, struggling to keep her eyes open. “I can tell you…now.” She yawned. “I was bribing him to let Marcus go. He is a guard stationed in the dungeon. I’ve been…getting to know him at the inn where I work for some time now…” Another yawn. “And…finally reached the point where it seemed…he was greedy enough to take the risk…. I offered him gold…”
Her voice trailed off.
Staring down at her, Nicholas saw with an odd tightening in his gut that she had fallen asleep in midsentence.
He lifted his own cloak from the floor and carefully draped it across her. Little Ari, Marcus’s small, impossible sister.
The troublesome brat had somehow become an incredibly sumptuous woman. Her beauty was not of the classical wan and ladylike fashion, however. No, it was far more potent and spellbinding than that. This girl with the clear violet eyes and the sensuous kitten’s face, the rich cascade of hair every bit as glorious as fire, had an intoxicating beauty that reached to his core and shook him like an oak in a windstorm. Her body was slim and delicate yet lushly curved. There was grace in the way she moved and elegance in the way she held her head. But her high cheekbones and full, soft lips hinted at a passion running not so far beneath that proper surface, a passion that sprang from her very soul.
Nicholas forced his glance away from her slender form. The last thing he needed now was to get distracted by Marcus’s exquisite and headstrong little sister. In fact, now that she was here, his job was doubly complicated. He had to rescue Marcus, ultimately find a way to overthrow Julian, and all the while keep Arianne safely out of the fray.
He suspected that would not be easy to do. But tomorrow he would send her packing—willingly or in chains, if need be.